7xm download apk Kingsview Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of NiSource Inc. ( NYSE:NI – Free Report ) during the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund bought 9,387 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $325,000. Several other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of NI. Cerity Partners LLC raised its holdings in shares of NiSource by 20.7% during the third quarter. Cerity Partners LLC now owns 119,180 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $4,130,000 after acquiring an additional 20,444 shares during the period. Citigroup Inc. raised its stake in NiSource by 17.8% during the 3rd quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 421,036 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $14,589,000 after purchasing an additional 63,563 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of NiSource by 0.5% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 3,914,196 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $135,627,000 after purchasing an additional 19,008 shares in the last quarter. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. acquired a new stake in shares of NiSource in the third quarter worth $32,162,000. Finally, Moran Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of NiSource during the third quarter valued at $3,068,000. 91.64% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors. NiSource Trading Down 0.3 % NiSource stock opened at $38.13 on Friday. NiSource Inc. has a one year low of $24.80 and a one year high of $38.56. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $35.37 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $32.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.17, a current ratio of 0.46 and a quick ratio of 0.35. The company has a market capitalization of $17.80 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.11, a PEG ratio of 3.18 and a beta of 0.51. Analysts Set New Price Targets Several research firms have weighed in on NI. Bank of America started coverage on NiSource in a research note on Thursday, September 12th. They set a “buy” rating and a $37.00 target price on the stock. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of NiSource from $35.00 to $38.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, October 21st. BMO Capital Markets lifted their target price on shares of NiSource from $34.00 to $36.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 12th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of NiSource from $35.00 to $38.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 16th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on NiSource from $36.00 to $38.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $37.50. Check Out Our Latest Stock Analysis on NiSource NiSource Company Profile ( Free Report ) NiSource Inc, an energy holding company, operates as a regulated natural gas and electric utility company in the United States. It operates in two segments, Gas Distribution Operations and Electric Operations. The company distributes natural gas to approximately 3.3 million customers through approximately 55,000 miles of distribution main pipeline and the associated individual customer service lines; and 1,000 miles of transmission main pipeline in northern Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Kentucky, and Maryland. Featured Stories Want to see what other hedge funds are holding NI? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for NiSource Inc. ( NYSE:NI – Free Report ). Receive News & Ratings for NiSource Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for NiSource and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter .

Baylor wins 6th straight as Sawyer Robertson throws 4 TDs in 45-17 win to end Kansas season

Your child has been asking for one for so long, and the holiday season might be the time –– especially if the gift will make this Christmas or Hanukkah magical. It’s not a puppy this time though. It’s a smartphone or tablet. This holiday season, many families may be considering giving their children their first device with direct access to the internet and social media. But while there can be benefits to being online, there are also real concerns about how it can affect children’s development, safety and mental health, said Dr. Anita Everett, director of the Center for Mental Health Services within the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Some experts have advocated delaying access to social media and smart devices for as long as possible. (Social psychologist .) However, if you’ve decided to put a first phone on your gift list, there are ways you can make the experience better. “It’s not that dissimilar than when the kid wants a puppy,” said Phyllis Fagell, a licensed clinical professional counselor, school counselor and author of “ Raising Resilient Tweens in Turbulent Times.” “You’re not going to just bring home the puppy, right? Or if you do, you’re probably going to end up with some unexpected issues that you didn’t prepare for.” You can prepare by becoming aware of the biggest concerns, knowing your child, setting boundaries, providing a good example with your phone use, and keeping lines of communication open, experts said. “Parents have an incredible opportunity to be influential in their children’s use of social media,” Everett said. “That’s why we want to do what we can to empower parents so that they feel like they can have a role with it.” When it comes to devices that can access the internet, obvious risks abound, such as being exposed to content that isn’t age appropriate, meeting strange adults or being bullied, said Dr. Hansa Bhargava, a pediatrician at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and chief clinical strategy and innovation officer for Healio, an information company for health care professionals. But experts also have concerns about the impact on children’s development, she added. “There’s a lot of literature and research to show that the smart devices for kids can really take away from their time where they should be spending with other people and socially developing,” Bhargava added. “It’s about the development of their brain.” Interacting in person has been shown to help in brain development as well as in reducing anxiety, she said. “Even a short conversation on the phone is better than texting,” Bhargava said. Although the possibility of developing device dependencies hasn’t been proven, there has been enough research to worry pediatricians, Bhargava said. Smart devices may influence dopamine, the neurotransmitter in your brain released when you do something pleasurable, in a way that is similar to how other addictive substances do, she added. Particularly in older kids, they may experience anxiety when the phone is turned off or they have to stay away from social media a bit, Everett said. Later is generally better when it comes to giving your child a smartphone, Bhargava said. But it is also important to look at the individual needs, obstacles and maturity of your child, she added. Not only will the appropriate age for having a phone vary by family but also by the individual child within that family. Will this child follow the rules you set around the phone? Does the child tend to get distracted easily? Does the child make impulsive decisions that might be regretted later? Knowing why your child wants a phone can also help make decisions around its use, Fagell said. If the child wants just to chat with friends, you might be able to strategize other options, such as a flip phone, for example, she added. “More often than not, what I hear from kids is that they want to make sure that they can connect with their friends so they’re not missing out,” Fagell said. What children can handle may change as they age and enter various phases with different contexts and influences. “I’ve seen sixth graders who use it beautifully, and seventh graders who use it beautifully and responsibly,” she said. “Then in eighth grade, maybe ... they’re hanging out with different kids, or trying to fit in with a different group or impress somebody in particular, and they may start making more mistakes.” You may have to change the boundaries, safety measures or even take the phone away entirely, Fagell said, and that’s OK. While the rules you set will be specific to your family, here are some guidelines with good ideas for many people. A good rule of thumb is life first and screens second, Bhargava said. Having a phone should not get in the way of school, activities, friends or even just the pastimes that are good for children’s development ­­–– such as art or reading, she said. Putting those things first can mean rules such as no phones at the dinner table, no phones until homework is done or no phones at school, Bhargava said. She has told her teens that they cannot have their heads in their phones when she picks them up from school or extracurricular activities so that they can chat about their day with her. For many reasons, no phone in the bedroom is a good idea. Not only does it help promote sleep, but it also protects adolescents from impulsive behavior behind closed doors, Fagell said. “The possibility that they’re going to make ... one of those reputation-damaging mistakes, is exponentially higher late at night, when they’re tired and on their own and on a device in the bedroom,” she added. “They’re also going to have a much harder time sustaining balance with regards to getting schoolwork and other things done.” For safety, you may want to have rules around the privacy settings on children’s phones and the people they can or cannot interact with online, Fagell said. You might want to make it clear that having a phone means you get to spot-check the content on it, but not in a punitive way, she said. “We want to know what kind of images they’re seeing, what kind of information they’re taking in, what kind of questions that might raise for them and to help them navigate it,” she said. “We want to really be attuned to what’s going on in their lives, how they’re using it, what kind of support they might need, and being ready to do a reset if needed.” Your kids aren’t the only ones who take on responsibility with a smartphone. You do, too, Bhargava said. “Do you as a parent have enough time to monitor this?” she asked. “Parents are very busy these days, and unfortunately, they’ve been given the task of being the guardians of screen time and social media as well. “Do you have actually time to sit down with your kids and monitor that and or at least sit down with them once a week to make sure they are following the rules?” But what about how you use your phone? It is hard to enforce rules you don’t follow, so make sure that your face isn’t in your phone during family dinners and that you are prepared to put your phone in the family basket at bedtime as well, she said. “Parents have tremendous opportunity to be role models for their children and how they use social media and when they put down social media,” Everett said. Establishing rules and habits will likely not be enough when you give your child a phone — you will need to have important conversations, too. Accessing the internet has positives, such as learning about the world and expanding community, but kids also need to know that it comes with a responsibility to be a good digital citizen, Bhargava said. “Don’t bully people, and then also report if you are bullied,” she said. “Don’t try and exclude people. Don’t talk to people who you don’t know.” Children need to know that what they do online can cause harm to their reputation and that of others, and it may help for you to show examples from the news about how a mistake people made online followed them when applying for a job or to school, Fagell said. Another key conversation is ensuring your child understands the difference between a kid problem and an adult one, she added. Help your children understand “that under no circumstances are they equipped to support a child who is sharing their desire to hurt themselves — that they are actually doing more harm by not telling an adult,” Fagell said. Having an open dialogue means children know they can come to you if they have a problem or make a mistake online, Bhargava said. “If your child comes to you and says, ‘Look, I did this bad thing,’ have a straight face, don’t react, be calm and talk through it,” she said. “The best thing we can do as parents is to keep those lines of communication open.” The-CNN-Wire TM & © 2024 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved. To remove this article -

Driver Ben is carefully examining a bunch of red roses – peeling off their plastic wrapping and dead-heading any wilting stems. We’re standing on an ordinary residential road somewhere between Blackley and Moston , looking for an address among a row of identical 1930s-built houses. It’s a gorgeous late autumn day, resplendent blue skies but glitteringly cold, the crisp leaves carpeting the floor a burnished auburn-gold, everything sparkling with frost. In the distance, the snow-dusted shoulders of the Pennines are basking in the November sun. READ MORE: 'We've seen demand to help families in need double - but we almost had to close' Ben is no florist, and the roses are a little dog-eared, bearing a ‘reduced’ sticker, but they’ll perk up once they’ve been placed in water, drooping stems now deftly removed. And their inclusion in the parcel is just one of those little touches that makes Humans the foodbank with a difference. “When we’re packing orders, we will often have a conversation where we think, what else can we do for this family?” founder Lewey Hallewell told the M.E.N. “Say they’ve got a one-year old – have we got some wipes, nappies, baby food? Stuff they’re not expecting - but stuff that just lightens the load for that client.” Humans deliver their parcels to their clients in unmarked vans, to ensure privacy and help avoid the stigma that can surround using a food bank. And they give clients a choice over what they eat, catering to a variety of different dietary requirements including vegan, vegetarian and halal. Humans MCR's van stocked up with deliveries. (Image: Greta Simpson / Manchester Evening News) “A lot of clients have said they’ve come to us because they’ve been using a ‘normal’ foodbank and not had the best experience,” Ben says. “But Lewey has done a good job of making us different.” “He started this cause he used to use conventional foodbanks and would often get broken items and rotten veg.” This Christmas , the Manchester Evening News is supporting Humans MCR to deliver Christmas hampers to 1,000 people across Greater Manchester. You can find out more about the campaign and how to donate here . “I want people to eat food that they are familiar with, that is comforting to them,” said Lewey. “Because otherwise there is no dignity in that delivery.” “We love to include flowers as much as we can,” he added. “A lot of these people may never get flowers. We want it to be a nice treat for them.” Back on the road in north Manchester, Ben places the roses carefully on top of the food crate, grabs a bag of fresh fruit and veg, and carries it all to the door of its recipient. The flowers certainly have the desired effect. “Wow!” exclaims the woman who opens the door, wrapped in a dressing gown with an eye mask perched on her head. Behind her is a cluttered but cosy-looking living room, washing hanging up to dry, a dog yapping somewhere, and a toddler in a high chair looking disconcertedly at the strangers at the door. “I wasn’t expecting all this. Thank you so much.” Ben says he was told when he first started that some clients might “feel ashamed” about receiving their parcels. “I didn’t see it much at first, but there have been a few people where it’s been obvious that they were.” “So for me it’s a case of making them feel at ease with it. Telling them that lots of people need it and it’s not a bad thing - we’re here for a reason.” A food bank delivery ready for its recipient - with flowers on top. (Image: Manchester Evening News) Our next stop is a quiet curving street in Blackley, dotted with 1970s red-brick complexes. Down to the basement flats, it’s toasty warm in the stairwell, with several prams parked outside the doors to the flats. A couple come to the door, bearing broad smiles to see who has arrived. They give words of warm thanks as they hand back the empty box. A carer takes in the next delivery. She too is surprised by how much has been brought: a crate’s worth of dry goods, plus the fresh items and another bag with an assortment of random but useful items. A toilet brush, a jumbo box of washing powder and a pair of thick winter socks – especially needed in this weather – are all included. “He’ll love this,” she smiles. At the third address, only a woman and her baby are at home. Originally from Syria, we speak with her husband over the phone. Not speaking any English, we get by with some rusty Arabic, and she gratefully takes in the box. Behind her are blue balloons and the bouncing baby in his chair, wearing a tiny England shirt. People are referred to the food bank by community professionals who think they might need it. This can be anyone from a local MP to a GP to a social worker. But as we make our rounds, it becomes clear that sometimes the details the referral partners have provided are wrong. Some clients have only half a mobile number; others, scant instructions on how to reach a particular address in a labyrinthine housing estate. It can’t be the easiest job in the world – but Ben enjoys what he does, and says it’s a nice change from his previous job delivering for a supermarket, where he says there was “a big corporate machine” hanging over him. “People are always very appreciative,” he says. “Very grateful. I’ve had people hug me before.” Another delivery for a client. Typically it will consist of a crate of dry goods and a bag of fresh produce (Image: Manchester Evening News) “The only thing I don’t always enjoy is driving itself – there are terrible drivers on the road. But that’s the only downside. Otherwise, I feel really appreciated, like I’m doing a really good thing for people.” Humans has its own delivery app which Ben uses to find clients’ addresses and get directions for his route. He rings each client before setting off – that is, if the number’s right – to give them notice that he’s coming. “They’re supposed to get a notification about it the day before,” he says, “but they’re not always in.” That means Ben is left with a difficult decision. “We can’t normally leave it outside unless there’s a secure location,” he says. “And we can’t really wait around either. That would mean Lewey having to pay me to wait, when there’s other people relying on our deliveries.” One such case happens on our route. We pull up on a terraced street in Gorton , but the woman on our list isn’t in. “I’ve just been at an induction for a job I’m starting,” she says down the phone. “I’m coming back on the bus, I’ll be about half an hour.” We can’t wait that long – Ben is on the seventh of fourteen deliveries on his route, and traffic is building as the school day draws to a close. The client suggests a neighbour we can leave the parcel with. Luckily, he is in, and instantly agrees to take it when Ben explains the situation. A happy ending – but it isn’t always the case. Ben sometimes has to give the news over the phone that delivery won’t be possible that day, which is hard. “You can hear the desperation down the phone,” he says. “I do have a lot of compassion, but I can be slightly numb to it all too. I think you need to have that kind of personality to get through the day in a job like this. “People explain their situations to you, and a lot of them are desperate. I’m good at talking to people and then not taking it on board. And it helps that you know you are providing relief to that situation.” Ben doesn’t handle the referrals side of things, so he can’t speak to whether Humans are busier now than when he started this January. Some addresses he has visited regularly; others are new. “A lot of people have had an injury or have fallen ill, so quite suddenly find themselves in a position where they can’t work,” says Ben. “We’re like a stop gap for that situation.” Humans has a community grocers scheme too, where people who apply can purchase supermarket groceries at a heavily discounted rate. “That helps people get back on their feet too,” Ben says. “But a lot of people take pride in telling me “this is the last time I’m going to need this,” he says. “And that once they're back on their feet, they're going to donate.” Humans MCR The Manchester Evening News Christmas Appeal is once again supporting Humans MCR, a charity doing incredible work to tackle hunger in Greater Manchester. This organisation is small but mighty - they work to tackle hunger directly. The charity is run by someone who has relied on foodbanks himself. We love this charity because they treat everyone with the dignity and respect we all deserve. Each week they provide a lifeline for 400 families and individuals across Manchester, Salford, Rochdale, Trafford, Stockport and Bury. All their food is delivered in unmarked vans so no one knows the people they help are getting support from a foodbank. And they give people in need a choice over what they eat, accommodating a range of diets including vegan, vegetarian, halal and gluten-free. The charity was set up by Lewey Hellewell whose own experience of using traditional food banks after being made redundant left him feeling that the process lacked dignity and compassion. People can be referred to the charity by any local community professional - including GPs, local MPs, health visitors, care and social workers - to get emergency food packages, delivered straight to their door in unmarked vans. This Christmas, they're expecting to deliver festive hampers to over 1,000 people in our region. The hampers have everything to make a full Christmas dinner - plus presents for children, and treats for adults. £12.50 will give a single person a food package for three days £36 will feed a family of four for three days £61 will provide a family with a Christmas hamper. Donate here.Kingsview Wealth Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. ( NASDAQ:IGIC – Free Report ) during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund acquired 13,944 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $265,000. Other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Diamond Hill Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in International General Insurance in the 3rd quarter worth $3,338,000. Deroy & Devereaux Private Investment Counsel Inc. boosted its stake in shares of International General Insurance by 31.6% in the third quarter. Deroy & Devereaux Private Investment Counsel Inc. now owns 189,300 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,597,000 after acquiring an additional 45,455 shares during the period. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC purchased a new stake in shares of International General Insurance during the third quarter worth about $303,000. Mackenzie Financial Corp bought a new stake in International General Insurance during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $411,000. Finally, Marshall Wace LLP lifted its holdings in International General Insurance by 276.8% in the 2nd quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 92,308 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,292,000 after purchasing an additional 67,809 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 54.24% of the company’s stock. Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades A number of brokerages have issued reports on IGIC. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price objective on shares of International General Insurance from $22.00 to $26.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, November 7th. Oppenheimer assumed coverage on shares of International General Insurance in a research note on Thursday, November 21st. They set an “outperform” rating and a $30.00 target price for the company. International General Insurance Trading Up 0.1 % Shares of IGIC stock opened at $25.95 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.19 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 8.48 and a beta of 0.21. International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. has a 12-month low of $11.51 and a 12-month high of $27.00. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $21.71 and its 200-day moving average price is $17.85. International General Insurance ( NASDAQ:IGIC – Get Free Report ) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 5th. The company reported $0.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.56 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $138.10 million for the quarter. International General Insurance had a return on equity of 22.78% and a net margin of 26.24%. As a group, research analysts predict that International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. will post 2.91 EPS for the current fiscal year. International General Insurance Announces Dividend The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, December 18th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, December 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.025 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, December 3rd. This represents a $0.10 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.39%. International General Insurance’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 3.27%. International General Insurance Company Profile ( Free Report ) International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. engages in the provision of specialty insurance and reinsurance solutions worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Specialty Long-tail, Specialty Short-tail, and Reinsurance. It is involved in underwriting a portfolio of specialty risks, including energy, property, construction and engineering, ports and terminals, general aviation, political violence, professional lines, financial institutions, motor, marine liability, contingency, marine, treaty, and casualty insurance and reinsurance. See Also Want to see what other hedge funds are holding IGIC? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. ( NASDAQ:IGIC – Free Report ). Receive News & Ratings for International General Insurance Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for International General Insurance and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter .

KILLINGTON, Vt. (AP) — American skier Mikaela Shiffrin said she suffered an abrasion on her left hip and that something “stabbed” her when she crashed during her second run of a World Cup giant slalom race Saturday, doing a flip and sliding into the protective fencing. Shiffrin stayed down on the edge of the course for quite some time as the ski patrol attended to her. She was taken off the hill on a sled and waved to the cheering crowd before going to a clinic for evaluation. “Not really too much cause for concern at this point, I just can’t move,” she said later in a video posted on social media . “I have a pretty good abrasion and something stabbed me. ... I’m so sorry to scare everybody. It looks like all scans so far are clear.” She plans to skip the slalom race Sunday, writing on Instagram she will be “cheering from the sideline.” The 29-year-old was leading after the first run of the GS and charging for her 100th World Cup win. She was within sight of the finish line, five gates onto Killington’s steep finish pitch, when she an outside edge. She hit a gate and did a somersault before sliding into another gate. The fencing slowed her momentum as she came to an abrupt stop. Reigning Olympic GS champion Sara Hector of Sweden won in a combined time of 1 minute, 53.08 seconds. Zrinka Ljutic of Croatia was second and Swiss racer Camille Rast took third. The Americans saw Paula Moltzan and Nina O’Brien finish fifth and sixth. “It’s just so sad, of course, to see Mikaela crash like that and skiing so well,” Hector said on the broadcast after her win. “It breaks my heart and everybody else here.” The crash was a surprise for everyone. Shiffrin rarely DNFs — ski racing parlance for “did not finish.” In 274 World Cup starts, she DNF'd only 18 times. The last time she DNF'd in GS was January 2018. Shiffrin also has not suffered any devastating injuries. In her 14-year career, she has rehabbed only two on-hill injuries: a torn medial collateral ligament and bone bruising in her right knee in December 2015 and a sprained MCL and tibiofibular ligament in her left knee after a downhill crash in January 2024. Neither knee injury required surgery, and both times, Shiffrin was back to racing within two months. Saturday was shaping up to be a banner day for Shiffrin, who skied flawlessly in the first run and held a 0.32-second lead as she chased after her 100th World Cup win. Shiffrin, who grew up in both New Hampshire and Colorado and sharpened her skills at nearby Burke Mountain Academy, has long been a fan favorite. Shiffrin is driven not so much by wins but by arcing the perfect run. She has shattered so many records along the way. She passed Lindsey Vonn’s women’s mark of 82 World Cup victories on Jan. 24, 2023, during a giant slalom in Kronplatz, Italy. That March, Shiffrin broke Swedish great Ingemar Stenmark’s Alpine mark for most World Cup wins when she captured her 87th career race. To date, she has earned five overall World Cup titles, two Olympic gold medals — along with a silver — and seven world championships. In other FIS Alpine World Cup news, the Tremblant World Cup — two women’s giant slaloms at Quebec’s Mont-Tremblant scheduled for next weekend — were canceled. Killington got 21 inches of snow on Thanksgiving Day, but Tremblant — five hours north of Killington — had to cancel its races because of a lack of snow. AP Sports Writer Pat Graham in Denver contributed to this report. More AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/alpine-skiingComplete N.J. Boys and Girls bowling season preview, 2024-25

Strange lights in the sky, little green men and crashed vessels secreted away to government labs — the relatively modern history of UFOs is replete with conspiracy theories and allegations of coverups. But beyond the endless arguments between believers and debunkers over what could be behind the phenomena, the fact remains that many people have looked into the sky and reported seeing things they cannot explain. So what do UFO reports tell us about ourselves? To discuss UFO sightings, how and why they first emerged, and the ways they tie into the cultural and political trends of the past and present, Live Science spoke with Greg Eghigian , a professor of history and bioethics at Penn State University, whose new book, " After The Flying Saucers Came " (Oxford University press, 2024), is one of the first social histories of UFOs, or unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP). Here's what he had to say. Ben Turner: A lot of people assume UFOs entered public consciousness with the Roswell incident . But your book says otherwise. When did it all begin? Greg Eghigian: I think when we look at this as a social phenomenon — not just simply someone saw something strange in the sky, but that the object was made by somebody, and that one of the probable scenarios is they were extraterrestrials — we can mark the moment that starts to evolve in June 24, 1947. The private pilot Kenneth Arnold sees these objects [that day] over Washington state when he's flying his plane. He lands and reports it to the military and to journalists. When asked how they flew, he answered that these things flew kind of like saucers skipping across the water. Then, within a day or two, a journalist comes up with this great headline: "Flying saucers." Once we had flying saucers, everything else fell into place. Sign up for the Live Science daily newsletter now Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. BT: But then Roswell happened just a few weeks later. How did a fairly small city in New Mexico become famous all over the world for UFOs, while Arnold's name remains relatively unknown? GE: Here's the thing about Roswell that a lot of people don't realize. The story that came out of Roswell is that some material had been retrieved around an Air Force base there that they believe could be from a crashed flying saucer. Within a day, the Air Force rolls that back, saying that it's not the case, the people who first found it were mistaken. The reality is that the people who were on the ground and found this stuff were not terribly qualified to talk about it. They didn't understand what they had, literally, in their hands, and the people who usually dealt with the material were actually off at a conference. When they did finally get a chance to look at it, they said, "Oh this is pretty mundane stuff," and they corrected themselves. So the Roswell thing gets a lot of air play, a lot of global news coverage for about 24 to 48 hours, and then it disappears. It's not really ever talked about, and leaves very little imprint on the UFO world for decades. It's then only in the late 1970s that some ufologists (and this is a very common thing in the UFO world) go back over the records, dig deeper into the story and believe that they found all these contradictions in it. That's when Roswell became a focal point. BT: Looking at the period of history where all of this kicked off, we have growing Cold War rivalry, the new existential threat of nuclear weapons, McCarthyism, fear of communism and Soviet Russia. It seems like a time that's ripe for paranoia and conspiracism. How much is all of the UFO stuff tied into that? GE: Oh, it's very tied in. I make the point in the book that I don't think the UFO phenomenon as we know it would exist without the Cold War. There are a variety of reasons for that, but one of the often forgotten aspects of this is World War II. WWII and the Cold War bring a number of critical things to the table for how UFO stories were built. Firstly, you have big governments. Big governments and big militaries. You look at the United States federal government in 1900 and it's not a big thing, it's not this monstrosity. By 1945, the U.S. government was a large bureaucracy with a big military. Secondly, what WWII taught everybody was that this institution can have secret programs that build remarkable technology, like the atomic bomb , as well as new kinds of airplanes such as jets. And of course, both conflicts also have a lot of spying. So when the UFO phenomenon emerges, the initial thought of just about everybody is that it has to be one of these superpowers. This has to be somebody doing surveillance. That's also a lot of the ways it's still spoken about today: Who's doing this? Who's keeping it a secret? What are their intentions? And could it harm us? So it's very much a part of it, and it haunts the story of UFOs for decades. BT: There are also interesting preludes to the Kenneth Arnold moment in 1947. One thing that flashes to mind is Orson Welles' 1938 radio broadcast of the "War of The Worlds ," which caused a mass panic that aliens were actually invading. Why did flying saucers take off in 1947 and not earlier? GE: I think the game changer is the atomic bomb. That something could be invented that we had no idea about, that is just presented to the world, and has this enormous destructive power that could wipe out all of humanity almost in an instant. When you ask why now, some people will respond that alien visitors have always been here and we're just noticing them now. But the argument that's usually presented is that it's probably because they [the aliens] saw us explode atomic bombs. This makes us capable of being conversed with, or a possible threat down the road. BT: There's an appeal to a higher power in it too, right? In a time when religion is falling by the wayside, after all the horrors of the past century, people were looking for something that could save us from ourselves. GE: There are certainly people who believe exactly that. The figure who lays all of this out is the psychologist Carl Jung. In the late 1950s, he wrote one of the first, and still one of the best, scholarly books on the topic . It makes this argument that, real or not, what they [UFOs] represent to people is this idea of salvation from something, at least that's the hope. By the early 1950s you see the beginning of UFO religious communities, almost all of them tied to the New Age Movement. BT: Everything you've said so far makes this seem like a firmly mid-20th century American phenomenon. I confess to having been partial to the History Channel's "Ancient Aliens" back in the day. Do sightings stretch across cultures and into the past, as they claimed? Or is that a post-hoc narrative? GE: This is a question that people debate pretty vigorously. There's no question that people reported seeing strange things in the sky dating back to ancient times. The most famous example is probably meteorites. For a long time the idea that rocks could fall from the sky seemed patently absurd, until people found out the reason is because there are a lot of rocks in space. The problem with going backward in time and retrospectively looking at stuff and saying: "Aha! Here's another example of a UFO," is that it's deeply, deeply problematic from a historical standpoint. Most of the time it involves an unintentional, and sometimes outright deliberate misreading of documents, artifacts or paintings. I've seen very good art historians, for instance, talk about paintings and say: "Oh my gosh, these things are clearly flying saucers!" When the objects they're referring to are objects in a particular religious ritual. or serve as a very symbolic trope. So it's very, very difficult to do that stuff [accurately]. BT: This touches on the methodology in your book. You take an agnostic approach: You don't take reports at face value, but neither do you dismiss them out of hand. How does one go about impartially assessing a UFO report? That's going to seem like a weird concept to people. GE: Yeah it is strange to people, and I know a lot of people who still don't like that I do that. For me, as a historian, it's partly the idea that I don't feel qualified to adjudicate some of these matters. I think some of these things have to be done by a meteorologist, a physicist, an astronomer or an engineer — someone who is far better qualified than I am to say what's possible and what's anomalous. But the other part is that this is the way I get to the things that most interest me, which are human beings. I say in the introduction of the book that UFOs don't make history, people make UFOs make history. That really is the main point; it's that I'm interested in the human part of that history. As far as we know today, UFOs don't have a natural history, they have a human history. Everything about them is related to our perception of them, our speculations and our discussions about them. The social fact of the UFO is very real, and it needs to be chronicled now. Whether these things also have a natural history I'm going to leave up to the researchers who do that stuff for a living. BT: When you work through these reports, I'm sure some of them on their surface are obviously bogus. But others come from people, pilots for instance, who have no interest in UFOs and are speaking out at significant personal and professional cost. Have you come across any real headscratchers? GE: Yeah a lot of them can be, or at least certain elements of them. Back in the 1950s, there was one case that the U.S. Air Force looked into that really set them back on their heels. These two seasoned civilian pilots for Eastern Airlines, reasonable fellows, who saw this very strange object during a flight, they could even make out details from it and it was like nothing they'd seen before. That's eerie and strange. They didn't have any explanation for it and certainly had no call to make it up — they weren't seeking fame and that wasn't a time you could make any money off this stuff. Then there's the case of Lonnie Zamora in the 1960s, he was a police officer in the American Southwest who stopped his vehicle because he thought he saw a crashed car. He sees this strange object with people in a kind of white uniform working around it. Then they flit off in it. By everybody's assessment at the time, he was a mild mannered guy, very cool headed and with absolutely no interest in publicity. He comes across as very sheepish in the radio interviews. That's another case where you sit there and think it's hard not to believe he saw something. Then you try to come up with explanations for what the possibilities could be. BT: How do the reports evolve over time? Do they change as the culture surrounding them comes into sharper focus? GE: Some things don't change that much. The overwhelming number of them are seeing patterns of lights, orbs or spheres of some kind that move in a strange way then whoosh away with no sound . That remains relatively unchanged from the beginning. But people also see cigar shaped things or triangles. A lot of these things are common across the world. What has changed more dramatically over the years and over different areas, has been the description of the occupants of these vessels, the aliens themselves. Early on in the 1950s and 1960s, a very common thing would have been to talk about seeing what appeared to be robots — looking like the Tin Man from the "Wizard of Oz." We don't tend to see robots anymore. Another very common thing during the 1950s and 1960s were what were dubbed, "little men." They weren't really described as green but little and usually gendered male for some reason. They typically stood at about 4 feet [1.2 meters], and in places like Malaysia, they were under 6 inches [15 centimeters] tall. Another very common thing in their descriptions was they were wearing old divers suits. Then you get to the 1970s and 1980s, and there's a veritable zoo of creatures: things that look like insects; in South America and [in] the Soviet Union big hairy creatures that look like a Bigfoot or a Sasquatch are particularly common. The one we have come to know as "the gray" is not all that common until the publication of Whitley Strieber's "Communion" book in 1987, from that point the idea of what an alien looks like really crystallized. BT: That's got to be one of the things debunkers point to: the fact that the culture is shaping what people see makes it easier to call it a mass delusion. GE: Yeah, the debunkers look at it and do that. What debunkers would like to do is to get even more concrete than that and say why somebody would see something at a particular time. They say there was a television show two weeks before someone's sighting. Then the person comes back and says I never watched it, and they go back and forth. I firmly believe that the media of all sorts plays a formative role shaping the way people think, talk about and even see things. But from my standpoint, this is where I might deviate from the debunkers. I don't think that simply explains things away. It just means that people are human beings, they are doing what we always do. When something happens to us that is really bizarre or unexplainable, it's not a surprise that what we tend to do is turn to analogies and to metaphors. It helps us to say, "Well, this was a little like this." BT: These debates persist up to the present day, but things have changed a lot too. We're sitting at the tail end of our own UFO — or should I say UAP — wave. And this time, after U.S. Navy footage of mysterious flying objects was released in 2017, we've seen a very different reaction from officials. There have been Senate hearings , task forces set up, and NASA has even been roped in . What happened? Is it because everyone in the U.S. government now also grew up on UFO lore? GE: A number of things have changed that have led to this becoming something seen as legitimate to ask questions about, and considered, even in academic circles, to be respectable to discuss. One thing is the reality of new surveillance and sensors to detect surveillance. In the United States, China and Russia there is an awareness of those technologies and, of course, a Keeping up with the Joneses attitude about them. The proliferation of drones is one thing. Drones are everywhere now. I was speaking to a Swedish ufologist a few years ago and he said that the number of sightings that involve drones has skyrocketed. On the extraterrestrial dimension, since the late 1990s astronomers have found out that exoplanets are pretty ubiquitous. That introduces the idea that planets are really all over the place, and that habitable planets are really pretty likely. I think that's made it easier to conceive of these things as possible. I've heard debunkers say they believe it's probable that there are extraterrestrial civilizations out there, they just don't think they're visiting us. You also have people who are actively involved in lobbying people to take this seriously. There's Robert Bigelow, the billionaire, who's funneled a lot of money into this cause. Lobbyists now have the ear of certain politicians in America who see this as a valuable issue to them in some ways. I think you have to always be a little cynical about politicians — they tend to be very pragmatic, and the fact that they come to this subject doesn't necessarily mean they're interested in UFOs, but in other things they can achieve. BT: What are politicians trying to achieve by embracing it? GE: I could conceive of them using this as a way to say they're going to keep money away from the military because they're not being honest brokers about this. The number one thing I keep hearing over and over again, from people on these committees and those who are maybe less interested, is spending and classification. U.S. military secrecy has been a big priority since at least WWII, certainly since the Manhattan Project, and it's only increased over the years. Then 9/11 really doubled, tripled down on that. This makes the UFO/UAP thing a great example for all these folks to say, "We've got all these whistleblowers saying all this stuff is going on. We haven't heard anything about it. You're keeping this from us. It's all supposedly classified. So we want in." BT: One of the frustrating things about covering these questions is that you get task forces that are essentially military task forces. People come out to say all kinds of spooky stuff , and when they're probed further they say we'll tell you the rest behind closed doors, and no we won't allow scientists into the bases where we saw this. Now that NASA 's involved, do you have more faith for civilian science projects to get to the bottom of things? GE: Yeah, spot on. I agree with you completely. It's why I always tell people that, personally, I don't think these military intelligence branches will be key to addressing these questions. I don't think you're ever going to get it from them. I'm also not someone who believes in full transparency, sometimes it's important to keep secrets. NASA's endorsement of research in this area is unprecedented, and I think it's very welcome. I know a lot of scientists who have started to try to conduct research along these lines. The problem we have is it has not translated into funding yet. A lot of the current efforts are on shoestring budgets and it's unclear whether that money is ever going to be forthcoming. So far, at least in the United States, it has not been. But there is a hope among a lot of researchers that that will change, because the climate has changed. Civilian scientists and researchers are going to be the key, because we operate in a world of transparency, with an openness that contractors and government don't have. BT: Do you think we'll ever get a solid answer? GE: I suspect we will be revisiting and speculating over this for a good long time to come. The world's been at this for over 75 years, and the most seasoned ufology veterans will tell you that not a lot has changed. If there is an opportunity for serious, empirically driven researchers to get involved, maybe then we'll actually start to see some real progress. But until that time, it seems to me we're still stuck in a cycle where we largely rely on hearsay and references to evidence that never turns up. Or, as you say, people saying I've got some information, but I can only tell you behind closed doors. That just leaves us with the mystery, which I know some people are satisfied with. Editors note: This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity. After the Flying Saucers Came: A Global History of the UFO Phenomenon $15.99 on Amazon If you enjoyed this interview with Greg Eghigian, you can read more about the history of UFO sightings in his new book, "After the Flying Saucers Came." It's a fascinating account of the global cultural phenomenon.